


Always London

by pennypaperbrain



Series: Four Corners of the Western World [5]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: BDSM, Bipolar Disorder, Bipolar Sherlock, Dom John, M/M, Post-Reichenbach, Psychological Drama, Sub Sherlock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-17
Updated: 2013-12-08
Packaged: 2018-01-01 21:02:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1048536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pennypaperbrain/pseuds/pennypaperbrain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After killing the final sniper, John and Sherlock arrive back in London. But how is Sherlock going to manage his sensational return from the dead, and how will it affect their relationship?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

_Late December_

**John**

They can’t go to Baker Street their first night back. At the appointed spot in a Heathrow car park they find the inevitable chauffeured black car, overseen by the inevitable black-clad woman, who smiles as if John registers somewhere between a security breach and crap on her shoe, and visibly texts, ‘Proceeding to K5.’

‘Your dear brother can’t meet us himself, then? Too busy for a family reunion?’ John mutters as the car purrs out into the midnight rain.

‘Mycroft watches everyone. Inevitably a few reciprocate,’ Sherlock responds, peering cautiously out of the window as the car approaches the main road. 

John settles back into his seat, feeling bleak. He isn’t exactly desperate to chat with the man who gave Moriarty the ammunition to destroy Sherlock, anyway. His leg is throbbing, he’s knackered, and if the entire press corps turned up screaming, ‘Fake genius rises from the dead!’ right now he’d probably just give them the finger. 

‘Great,’ he grunts. ‘We’ve really left the cloak and dagger behind us, then.’

‘K5’ turns out to be a fully-furnished fake-residential flat in an anonymous block in Shoreditch, no doubt bugged to high heaven. At least John no longer has to worry about Sherlock jumping out of the windows. He pulls his clothes off as soon as the ’Croft Girl withdraws, and falls asleep ten seconds after landing on the bed.

He wakes to see the digital clock showing 5.07am. Sherlock is jabbing him in the ribs.

‘Wake up!’ Sherlock whispers, unnecessarily. And why the hell is he bothering to whisper? But even sleep-sodden, John puts two and two together as soon as Sherlock points at the bedroom door. 

‘Oh. You two can actually detect each other through walls, can’t you?’ says John. 

‘Stop jabbering and come on,’ retorts Sherlock, shrugging into the dressing gown he left out the previous night. While John scrabbles for his own clothes, Sherlock tugs the door open, strides out into the living room and flicks on the light.

John gets a brief glimpse of Mycroft at the window in the half-dark, leaning on his umbrella and glaring moodily into the street before the entire room is bathed in yellow light and Mycroft practically launches himself away from the glass. Sherlock crosses to the window and pulls the curtains shut.

‘Oh dear, security breach?’ says Sherlock. ‘How sloppy. I should fire someone over that. Except, oh wait. I don’t work for you. Even if you’re about to treat me as if I do.’

Mycroft has already recovered his composure. John stays by the bedroom door doing up his shirt, still not fully awake, and not confident that he can be much use. But Sherlock has deliberately involved him.

‘Mycroft,’ John says. 

‘Ah, John, welcome back to England,’ says Mycroft, tapping his dry umbrella against his shoe. ‘I trust you are well?’

‘Do you? I’ve been shot again, I’ll have lost my job for running off without notice and I rather think I’m starting a cold.’ 

‘Oh dear, perhaps –’ starts Mycroft.

‘John, you can shoot him later,’ interrupts Sherlock. ‘Mycroft, you want me to do a press conference, I suppose?’

Mycroft pulls a pained face. He begins pacing the room, frowning at the tip of his umbrella.

‘Well, Sherlock, “want” does not, in fact, describe how I feel about you addressing the national media live and uncensored. Nevertheless, you are broadly correct, and my people are on it. The story will break this morning, after which the Metropolitan Police will be our hosts for the press conference, as the accusations against you were initially a regrettable blunder on their part. You will be provided with a statement by my people, and you will read it, after which I regret to say you will take questions from the press – it will seem too staged if you don’t. Ah well. Once the truth is out, I’m sure that the _The Sun_ in particular will be eager to print a full retraction, accompanied by the correct version of the story.’

‘OK...’ says John slowly, trying to fire his brain up. Sherlock has already briefed him on the ‘correct’ version: _Sherlock unmasked Moriarty, who then put him in fear of his life, leading him to fake suicide, after which Moriarty was killed by one of his own assassins and Sherlock went into hiding abroad while the evidence could be gathered to clear his name..._

‘You mean the trite lowest common-denominator version,’ says Sherlock, then waves his hand as if grudgingly downplaying his own words. ‘Yes, yes. Effective, nevertheless, I’m sure.’

‘ _If_ you stick to it,’ says Mycroft. ‘If you do not, well, I may or may not be able to protect you from deportation to face murder charges. Speaking of which, you might have left someone alive for us to arrest. We’re having to use a little sleight of hand there.’

‘Really?’ Sherlock gets up again and begins to fiddle with the curtain. ‘All this trouble you’re going to might be touching if it weren’t for the fact that you fed me to Moriarty in the first place.’

Mycroft goes still. ‘Yes, well, I think that by concealing your plans from me you punished me quite sufficiently, and partly at your own expense. I could have helped, Sherlock, in a hundred small ways and not a few larger ones. I’ve wondered many times why you rejected that possibility, and I suspect John has too.’

‘I did, at first,’ says John stiffly. Since Malta he’s had a very good idea of Sherlock’s reasons, but he isn’t about to betray them to Mycroft. When asked about Mycroft and personal information, Sherlock insisted, ‘Tell him _nothing_. He’ll deduce most of it anyway.’

‘As if you were fooled, Mycroft,’ snaps Sherlock now, from over by the window. ‘It was child’s play to work it out. The angle of fall, the identity of the people who picked me up. You...’

‘Didn’t _know_ ,’ Mycroft interrupts heavily. ‘Obviously we monitor rumours, and I heard you were sighted in Morocco and New York – also in Hull, which I take to be an error – and then John went on holiday and neglected to come back, so yes, there were strong indications of the truth.’ Mycroft looks sideways at John. ‘Unless of course you are the tabloid press, in which case Dr Watson’s mysterious disappearance leads directly to the highly exciting conclusion that the lovelorn bachelor has done away with himself in emulation of his disgraced lust object.’

Dear God. But on some level John must have seen that coming, because it only takes a few seconds for his anger to harden into defensive steel. ‘Fine. Hardly surprising,’ he says. ‘At the press conference, I am just not answering that kind of question. End of.’

‘Hm, well,’ Mycroft’s smug smile thins. ‘I note from the rather blatant tells that the two of you are now in fact in a sexual relationship... and I note from your reaction to that statement, John, that you consider it to be romantic in nature. My brother is a surprising choice for that kind of attachment.’

‘Yes, you always did prefer me doing coke in toilets,’ says Sherlock, patting around the edge of the window-frame and uncovering a small camera with an exaggerated grimace. ‘Easier to patronise. Jealous, are we?’

‘Sherlock, the cameras were switched off as soon as I arrived. Do you think I want this recorded?’ Mycroft looks exasperated. ‘To return to my point, public attitudes to homosexuality may have eased, but they are hardly unremittingly positive. Discretion is advisable.’

‘Yes, you certainly are the person to give advice on hiding in the closet. But why be coy with me?’ Sherlock strolls over to his brother, first rolling up his sleeve and then opening the front of his dressing gown wider. ‘I can see you trying to deduce the marks. Well done; they’re quite faint now. No I haven’t been shooting up. I was planning to give _The Daily Mail_ an exclusive on how in Malta we killed two assassins and then John chained me up in the cellar and tortured me for our mutual and extremely homosexual pleasure. But you think perhaps I shouldn’t?’ 

While Sherlock is speaking, Mycroft’s gaze goes to his chest, then to his wrist, then back. He must be interpreting tiny chafes that John can’t even see from over here. Whatever Mycroft is deducing, it’s clearly more than he can immediately digest.

Screw discretion. John's going to show where he stands. He comes up behind Sherlock and puts a hand on his arm.

‘I think –’ starts Mycroft angrily, and then pauses. He lays his umbrella on the dining table, then sits down in a chair opposite them. With an ambiguous pang, John feels Sherlock’s hand wrapping around his own. Sherlock is all but vibrating with tension.

‘ _I_ think, brother,’ Mycroft starts again, giving his hard, political smile ‘– that you haven’t tried so hard to shock me since you were fourteen. If you’re not merely showing off, then, well... all I can say is, it’s small wonder Irene Adler managed to play you. Good grief.’ Mycroft holds up his hand to forestall interruption. ‘It’s all right, John. Your tastes are hardly incongruous with your personality profile, and I should applaud your selection of a consenting subject.’ 

Sherlock growls at that. But John isn’t about to rise to the needling. 

‘Yes, I am a sadist,’ he says. ‘Sherlock’s a masochist. So we’re a couple who play sex games: how shocking. Do you expect us to believe you really give a toss?’

‘Perhaps not,’ concedes Mycroft, with a brief, cold smile. He settles into his armchair and shoots Sherlock a look that is wistful, sad, protective, fearful... and passes in an instant. ‘You have correctly divined, John, that this subject is not my favourite. And _I_ have divined that my brother is exploiting the fact. His telling me the truth on a personal matter is an unusual development, presumably intended to distract me from the question of what’s really going on here. I don’t mean your, ah, completed programme of justice.’ Mycroft pauses and steeples his fingers. ‘I mean, Sherlock, the source of tension that I detected in your voice on the phone, and that I presume is fuelling the show of adolescent defiance you’ve put on this morning. John knows what it is and I don’t.’

John is brought up short. Just how isolated is this guy? _There but for the grace of God_ , John finds himself thinking. 

‘Don’t you have some ministers to go and coerce?’ is all he says aloud.

Sherlock speaks at exactly the same time: ‘I have bipolar disorder.’

Sherlock’s voice was uncertain and John’s loud. The result is Mycroft saying ‘I’m sorry?’ and raising his eyebrows, looking genuinely unsure.

‘I have bipolar disorder,’ repeats Sherlock in a much clearer voice. He seems to be trying for boredom in his tone; he manages hostility. ‘You know what that is, Mycroft, or at least you know some clichés.’

Mycroft is staring. ‘Bipolar disorder?’ he queries, almost blankly.

‘Yes. I didn’t contact you when I disappeared because I was already half-way manic, and I didn’t want you trying to fix me,’ explains Sherlock calmly. John increases the grip of the hand on his arm. He didn't expect this but – well. Support first, pick up the pieces later. ‘I didn’t think I needed anyone.’ Sherlock shrugged. ‘I _didn’t_ need anyone. Mania is rather compelling.’

‘I see,’ says Mycroft slowly. He has his head at an angle, looking at Sherlock as if beginning a reassessment process in spite of himself. ‘Dr Watson...?’ 

‘The diagnosis is mine,’ says John. Is Sherlock's odd calm due to lithium? More likely it's a brewing explosion. ‘I was hardly going to take him back to the nice doctor who said he was a sociopath. And yes we’re certain, as far as you can be with mental health issues. The labels are on the arbitrary side, because nobody really knows what the underlying pathology is yet.’ 

There is a snort. ‘Psychiatry! Passes for a science!’ Sherlock declares. He’s started dismantling Mycroft’s spy camera.

‘Hm,’ says Mycroft, regarding the demise of the machine with a longsuffering expression. ‘Are you taking something for this, Sherlock?’

‘Lithium. It stopped me wanting to kill myself all the time. You do realise this camera broke down two days ago anyway?’

‘Ah, well, my staff have been busy – assassinations to cover up, enormous damage limitation campaigns to organise. Honestly Sherlock, I think we all knew you’d inherited Mummy’s nerves, but _manic depression_?’

Sherlock freezes. Then his head shoots up. ‘Yes. Do you have difficulty understanding the term?’

‘I have difficulty understanding what you think to gain from this... label. It’s not like you to try to justify your bad behaviour. You’re usually proud of it.’

The remains of the camera go skittering across the dining room table as Sherlock takes two swift paces to lean over Mycroft, all but in his face.

‘ _I_ justify myself to _you_?’ Sherlock snarls, and then his voice changes to a bitter imitation of his brother’s. ‘“Calm down, Mummy. Stop imagining things. Don’t embarrass the family.” Of course, you and Father also made clear that nothing better could be expected of a woman who wasn’t a real Holmes, anyway. Well, I am a real Holmes.’

‘Then act like one!’ Mycroft rises suddenly, so that Sherlock has to retreat to avoid being head-butted. ‘For years I’ve been trying to get you to medicate your down periods, and you threw it in my face in favour of poisoning yourself with cocaine. If Dr Watson’s knocked some sense into you on that score, I applaud him.’

‘Sense? You don’t begin to understand what you’re talking about. I’ve experienced things that would smear your constipated little mind across the back of your skull. I’ve had moodswings that felt like my brain was being ripped open and stuck together backwards. I couldn’t think. _I_ couldn’t think! I wanted to die. And you believe a pill makes it all go away?’

Silence.

‘But you are taking the pills?’ asks Mycroft, cautiously. Then with growing confidence: ‘Mummy took her pills and she was fine for years before her accident.’

Sherlock explodes.

‘The _wrong_ pills! You and Father made her, you – stop saying _accident_ because you can’t cope with reality. If you're bipolar, antidepressants can cause hostility, violent agitation, and – well, what else do you think? Care to make a deduction?’

Sherlock leans back stiffly against the cheap dining table, taut with anger, staring at his motionless brother.

‘You think dramatic language helps?’ Mycroft says in a rather high, brittle voice. ‘If Mummy had bipolar –’ A glance at John, who nods. ‘– well surely she wasn’t – the treatments are better now, of course?’

Suddenly he’s almost pleading. John has seen this before, as it dawns on a patient’s relatives that a situation is real. 

‘People who have the kind of bipolar that Sherlock seems to have inherited did use to be treated with antidepressants quite often, yes. The good news is that medical science has learnt a lot since the eighties. Sherlock seems to do well on lithium.’

Mycroft gives a jerky nod.

‘You could perhaps say I was afraid of something like this for him.’ There is an actual tremor in his voice and his hands shake as he smooths his immaculate hair. John sees Sherlock’s eyes kindle and his posture ease as he observes. ‘But I dared to hope that it would have shown up earlier if it was going to. I suppose it did, really, if you’re telling me that the – well, yes. John, is he – I mean, in the future...’

‘You mean am I contagious? Rabid? Terminal?’ Sherlock suggests. ‘Perhaps you want to know if I’m stable. And yes, I am. But no, I’m not cured.’

‘People take lithium for decades without problems,’ says John. ‘But no, we can’t take that for granted. I’ll be monitoring him.’

‘Of course, yes. We appreciate your expertise, Dr Watson,’ says Mycroft. ‘Even if my brother may not always express himself entirely graciously.’ 

_We?_ Mycroft has some cheek, as if John didn’t know that.

‘I wouldn’t have troubled you with this, Mycroft,’ says Sherlock. ‘But John insisted, and I respect his medical judgement.’

What?! Now both brothers are regarding John with the _dear-me-ordinary-people-eh_ expression that constitutes their main family resemblance. And John is... John is...

John is going to play along, because he understands what this is. If it puts him on the other side of the fence from Sherlock for five minutes, he can bear that.

‘As his brother, you’re Sherlock’s next of kin,’ says Dr Watson. ‘So legally and medically it’s best procedure to keep you posted. I’m pleased you understand.’

‘These matters can be delicate, but I commend your approach,’ says Mycroft.

‘Yes, well, I accept it as a tiresome necessity,’ says Sherlock, going back to examining the tiny camera lens. ‘I look forward to my diagnosis finding its way into the hands of every psychopath who ambles through your office.’ 

Mycroft stands up and rearms himself with his umbrella. ‘Really, I think you know that error will not be repeated.’ Then he pauses, and taps his brolly against his shoe, and such an odd, soft expression comes over his face that John almost thinks it’s time to melt away into the other room and put on his headphones... ‘Now,’ Mycroft says briskly. ‘I must get back to Whitehall for a breakfast briefing. The Chinese delegation will not change their timetable for the small matter of your return from the dead, after all. I look forward to your press conference.’

‘I don’t,’ responds Sherlock, eyes on the mechanism in his hands. ‘Smarming a horde of half-wits is rather more in your line.’

‘Ah hah. Well. I’m sure you will do splendidly as we are, in fact, rather closely related.’ 

‘Mycroft –’ says Sherlock suddenly. When Mycroft looks over his shoulder with a rather studied blank expression, he goes on, ‘For goodness’ sake get Mrs Hudson over here. I didn’t shoot Graf so she could find out I’m alive through the media and die of a heart attack.’ 

Mycroft nods. ‘Consider it done,’ he says. ‘Thank you, John. Good day.’

Mycroft is gone.

‘That was unexpected,’ says John levelly, going over to Sherlock

‘His reaction?’ Sherlock continues fiddling with the broken camera. ‘Oh, obvious. He can’t cope. He’ll never mention it again. He’ll pretend it didn’t happen.’

‘Very likely. But I meant you telling him in the first place.’

Sherlock gives John a glare, presumably meant to convey that John is on dangerous ground. 

Bugger that. John _lives_ on dangerous ground. So he says the thing that’s been at the back of his mind all through the Mycroft encounter.

‘I actually truly _don’t_ love Harry, Sherlock. There’s no connection, she’s just this false grinning woman with suspiciously fresh breath. I thought maybe I should text her saying “I’m alive” but frankly she wouldn’t care apart from the embarrassment of it all, and then we might have to talk, so I haven’t.’

There. That’s all the lecture Sherlock’s getting. John delivered it matter-of-factly but now it’s out in the air it seems to have left a painful gap inside him that takes its time to close. He breathes deeply, aware of Sherlock’s scrutiny.

‘I see,’ is all Sherlock says. Then he puts down the bits of camera, and there is that one-second hitch between the action and his next words. 

‘I loved my mother. Mycroft loved our father.’

John nods. ‘I guessed. I have to break it to you though, you’re not going to drive him off.’

‘You think I was trying to do that?’ 

‘I’m betting you’ve tried quite a few times,’ says John. The scene comes easily to his mind’s eye: a younger Sherlock, hypomanic and drugged up, raging scared and trying to claw his way past Mycroft’s repressed exterior before giving up and simply trying to shred him completely.

‘Come back to bed,’ says Sherlock softly.

John looks at him. The Sherlock who could say that is not the version Mycroft knows. 

Johns switches off the light, and they go.

 

**Sherlock**

Tempting as it is to suggest that John ride his cock while choking him for the benefit of Mycroft’s cameras, Sherlock suspects John would refuse, and elects for a cuddle and sleep instead. 

Mycroft’s reaction was actually quite intelligent by his standards. He almost admitted that Sherlock’s bipolar exists and that it does so for reasons other than simply to annoy civil servants. Holding John, staring at the ceiling in the dark, Sherlock is satisfied with that. Lithium does not let him stay angry. It’s strange, to not even want the anger. So much is strange. With input from John, he works around it.

Sherlock sleeps.

Around seven-thirty, a pair of ’Croft girls make a noisy entrance. Sherlock snaps immediately alert, while John is moaning and grumbling about ‘Didn’t we just do this?’ Today is Sherlock’s return, his revelation, his victory. All of which things are asinine, but also essential to regaining his work. Work itself will further increase his control of the situation.

He is winning, to an extent that not one of the media chimps whose game he will have to play could imagine. They will have no idea what he previously lost, and he certainly will not tell them. Fire in the sky and death in the snow are filed away, experiences he has learnt from but will not repeat. He is calm and focused.

He just keeps getting jolted.

Mycroft’s people bring Mrs Hudson to them as promised, shoving her into K5’s pastel living room as if it were a cell. As soon as she sees them she plumps down in an armchair with her hand on her heart and cries ‘Oh boys, I thought I’d lost you both!’ Then she’s up again and trying to hug the pair of them at once.

Sherlock hugs back. She feels thinner than before, and the deepening of her facial wrinkles is more appropriate to the elapse of six years than six months. He wants to smash whatever’s upset her, except this time the cause is him. 

His reaction is irrational. But she’s just so... small.

‘We’re back,’ he says. He has the impulse to tell her about his illness, which is ridiculous. Now he’s handled Mycroft, he need never mention it again. There are many things they need to keep from her, and bipolar is one.

She’s crying. John is telling her how sorry he is, and how essential all the trouble was, and how everything will be peaceful now. That does not strike Sherlock as an entirely supportable projection.

What can he do for her? How to explain?

‘We’d like to return to living at Baker Street,’ he says. That’s certainly true.

Mrs Hudson turns to him with her scolding expression. ‘Of course you must! You were all alone for months...!’

‘I did call John.’ 

‘Eventually,’ mutters Mrs Hudson, reprovingly. ‘Well. There’s more to this than meets the eye, I can tell.’

‘Perhaps,’ agrees Sherlock. God, he remembers hunting Graf through Vegas, imagining him shooting Martha Hudson and leaving her to die on her kitchen floor. And here she is. What gesture would be big enough to acknowledge that?

Sherlock goes over to John, puts an arm around him and kisses him. 

The deliberate show feels like a borrowing from the mundane world rather than something he himself would do. However, since he is doing it, evidently it’s part of his repertoire now. And Mrs Hudson’s reaction is immediate.

‘Oh!’ she breathes, wide-eyed. ‘Oh, Sherlock! Oh, at last. I am so glad. You _can_ behave like normal people – well, normal people nowadays. That sort of thing wasn’t thought of in my time. But I’m so pleased for you both!’ 

‘Yes, completely normal, that’s Sherlock,’ agrees John drily, with a quick lift of the eyebrows that suggests there’s going to be a conversation about this later. 

Sherlock lets Mrs Hudson kiss him again, and tell him over and over how glad she is. He’s even sitting with his arm around her when his phone bleeps. It’s Mycroft.

The news has broken.

 

An hour later, on the approach to New Scotland Yard, reporters and photographers elbows each other in the grey drizzle as they scramble up to John and Sherlock’s tint-windowed car.

‘Anyone would think we were talentless pop singers,’ jokes John without much humour. ‘Sherlock Holmes versus Simon Cowell – I might pay to see that.’

‘I’m sure this work of fiction is much more exciting,’ Sherlock says, holding up the statement he’s been given from Mycroft. 

Outside, a cry of _Has he got the hat?_ rises above the general clamour. 

‘Are you going to actually stick to it?’ John asks.

Sherlock shrugs. Mycroft’s team has produced some pretty watertight weasel-wording, so there’s no point wasting his skills improvising when he should be using them to perfect his visual act. ‘It’s good. For a pack of egregious semi-falsehoods.’

The rim of a camera viewfinder all but scores a hole in the window next to him. Sherlock turns up the collar of the Belstaff, which Mycroft’s people brought him this morning. Wearing it again is bizarrely comforting. John hunches defensively in his seat and glares around.

‘If I wanted this kind of attention I’d be snogging Beyoncé, not you,’ he says. ‘Better tits, as well.’

The joke is unfunny, but mostly a sign of John’s unease, so Sherlock lets it slide. John has always felt uncomfortable with the media, with plenty of justification. Soon they will be over this, back at Baker Street, taking cases and – and what exactly? Will the new side of their relationship translate?

Sherlock can’t concentrate on that now. Someone’s opening the car door; time to fight his way through the crowd.

It being the ‘festive’ season, the Yard is festooned with scrappy tinsel, and staffed in part by people who have clearly been called back into work in a hurry. The team that closes in around them is surprisingly junior-looking: chattering PR execs and a couple of sergeants with worried expressions. They are in obvious disarray, focusing mostly on the shepherding ’Croft girls who are giving instructions about the party line. Sherlock ignores the frank stares and whispers. John is stony-faced beside him.

There’s a detour to a room where make-up is applied, then everyone sets off again. The chaos as they all straggle through the building is sufficient to let a grey-haired figure in casual clothes worm his way through the crowd and clap a hand on John’s shoulder. Sherlock keeps facing ahead as they walk, but he turns his eyes to catch Greg Lestrade’s.

‘You absolute fucking tossers!’ The ex-DI stays just ahead of them. One of the ’Croft girls seems to accept his presence, and she is ushering the entourage to give him space. ‘What the _hell_ is going on?’ 

‘Pleased to see us, then?’ says John cautiously. ‘You got my text?’

‘Frankly I thought someone’d nicked the phone off your corpse and was playing silly buggers, but yeah, course I’m pleased. Except _what the fuck?_ ’

‘You’re about to hear what’s going on,’ says Sherlock. Suddenly it’s difficult to keep a straight face. But there are a lot of eyes on him. Should he hug Lestrade? It would be appropriate for masculine re-acquaintance... Then Lestrade hugs John instead, in a sort of awkward, blokey, on-the-move half-clinch. John responds in kind. 

‘It’s OK, mate,’ John says, with more determination than eloquence. Incoherence is socially valued on these occasions. Sherlock is wondering if he can achieve the right tone when Lestrade takes a couple of deep breaths.

‘Right, well, I’m sure the unvarnished truth will be broadcast for all to hear,’ he says. Then his voice drops. ‘Whatever, Sherlock, it’d better be good.’

Sherlock observes that Lestrade has been working a pseudo-civilian desk job since his demotion, probably pending some means of quietly removing him altogether. He’s been smoking, and has put on weight. He’s been working in a sunless room. 

That is going to end.

‘It will be good,’ Sherlock says. Lestrade has enough brains to take that as it was meant: _It will get you your job back_. A small smile appears on his face. Sherlock feels... lighter. Lestrade’s anger is an uncomfortable thing.

‘I’ll hold you to that,’ says Lestrade. ‘You know BBC News is leading with “Shock return of vindicated Holmes” already?’ 

Sherlock nods. He does know that. It means this is working. The media are buying the story.

‘Are you coming to the actual press conference?’ says John. 

‘Nah. Not allowed anywhere near this – yet. What’s going to happen is, we are going to have a drink. Not anywhere with journalists. You’ve got my number.’ Lestrade puts a hand on Sherlock’s arm as the whole group of what must be two dozen accrued people came to a rambling halt. 

‘Deal,’ says Sherlock. One of the ’Croft girls is now indicating by various means that Lestrade should bugger off.

‘The whole thing never added up for me,’ Lestrade persists, ignoring her. ‘Vain git like you offing yourself? You’re too stubborn for that.’

Sherlock feels a half-smile on his lips. He believes it’s a natural one, but it also appears to have stalled. _Vain git like you offing yourself_. He is irrationally discomfited.

‘I’m sure it seems unlikely,’ he responds. ‘But experimental data alters theory. See you later.’

He gives a curt nod and sweeps into the media suite, aware of John waving a slightly awkward ‘See you!’ gesture at Lestrade, then nipping in behind.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After their sensational return to London, John and Sherlock have to ride out press hysteria, not to mention encounters with old friends and enemies. And once the dust has settled, how does it leave things between the two of them?

**John**

The statement is dry, but Sherlock’s acting skills make it compelling. By general agreement Mrs Hudson is being left out of this, but Sherlock’s voice bubbles with rage as he relates the death threats against John and Lestrade, then turns quietly tragic as he describes faking suicide and fleeing from country to country to avoid assassination by members of Moriarty’s network who saw through his plan. Finally he is steely and stern as he unveils selected revelations about the true nature of ‘Richard Brook’, such as the five occasions on which he was questioned by Home Office agents on terrorism charges. Further information, Sherlock assures the audience in Mycroft’s words, will be amply supplied after the conference.

The assembled journos are rapt. John squints from behind his mic into the blinking eye of a BBC camera and knows that this is going out live on the news channel and is likely to make it into most of the lunchtime bulletins. The broadsheets are here, the tabloids, the TV stations, the websites... even some foreign journalists looking like they half-suspect this is a Christmas wind-up. Everyone and his digital recorder-toting dog wants to have a good gawk at Sherlock Lazarus Holmes, and their reactions are visibly mixed, ranging from delight (because they support Sherlock or because think this is all a great joke?) to deep scepticism. The man from _The Sun_ looks like he’s swallowed a lemon; good.

But John is starting to seriously appreciate Mycroft’s cover-up operation. The digging into what Sherlock did while on the run will surely begin the moment this press conference is over. Yes the killing of Kolyvanov could possibly be justified as self-defence, and the same might work for Zagami if it weren’t for the lack of witnesses, but Graf and Tabone? 

Shit, John should not even be thinking about this stuff. At any one time, about a fifth of the eyes in the room are on him. It feels like they can read his mind.

He just wishes this was over.

‘I hold no ill will towards Miss Riley for her honest mistake,’ reads Sherlock as the cameras endlessly click and flash. ‘Her gullibility is not criminal, although it may have implications for her employment as an investigative journalist.’

John can practically hear the swearing coming from the _Sun_ editorial office. The fantasy threatens to make him smile. But Sherlock is finishing his statement, so it’s time for questions, and John knows there will be some addressed to him.

‘You said you were travelling from country to country to avoid detection by Moriarty’s associates. Where exactly did you go?’ a serious man in glasses asks Sherlock.

‘I’ve been asked not to reveal that information as British special agents are continuing their operations to eradicate the network.’

‘When will we see the further evidence concerning Moriarty’s criminal activities?’ This from a waspish woman who sounds like she suspects the whole thing is a hoax.

‘A dossier containing comprehensive details will be distributed after this press conference.’

‘The scandal surrounding your apparent criminality and suicide had considerable repercussions for the Met. Do you have any comment?’ The journalist asking that question seems to think embarrassing the police is an amusing achievement.

‘I feel confident that the Metropolitan Police will restore Detective Inspector Lestrade to his post immediately.’ 

And so on. John’s gut tells him that most of the people in the room have been won over to the idea that Sherlock is back in business and that Moriarty was a bad lot, even if the six months in hiding is piquing their suspicions.

‘What next for you?’ asks a woman whose garb suggests she was yanked out of a party to come here. 

‘I intend to return to my work as a consulting detective, ably assisted by my medical colleague Dr Watson.’ says Sherlock to the flashing, recording air. There’s another question, which John can’t hear but Sherlock clearly does: ‘Are Dr Watson and I in a relationship? All human beings exist in relationship to one another, Mr Abrams. You and I are in a relationship, albeit an extremely one-sided one.’

In his mind, John clearly hears Sherlock’s voice adding, ‘Yes, Dr Watson beats me for sexual pleasure, and my goodness what a pleasure it is.’ Of course he doesn’t actually want Sherlock to say that... but oh for a life where nobody would care if he did. 

It’s been just John and Sherlock against the world for so long, and it still is, but now the world is staring and shooting questions instead of bullets. It should feel better. It is better. 

John fucking hates it. 

‘Question for Dr Watson. Why did you disappear and join Sherlock?’

Shit. Here goes. 

‘I could have waited for him to come back, but he’s my friend and he’d been through a tough time. When he contacted me, I thought, well I’m a former soldier, and he needs a bodyguard.’

That’s true enough to shore up their story without giving anything away.

‘And you just told people you were going on holiday?’

‘I wasn’t going to advertise that I was off to join a fugitive in fear of his life, was I?’

God, he’s copping an attitude now – just what he told Sherlock not to do. There’s an appreciative murmur, though.

A reporter John recognises from ITV says: ‘Were you angry when you found out he’d faked suicide?’ 

‘Of course. But I understand why he did it. It’s fine.’

Immediately John knows he shouldn’t have added the _It’s fine_. He sounded too defensive. As if it matters – half the reporters will make up whatever bollocks they want, anyway. Fuck. 

At least the police press officer is finally calling proceedings to a close. She’s really attractive, John registers. In fact they’ve been surrounded by pretty media types since they arrived and he didn’t notice. Is he still John Watson, or what?

‘I thought that went well,’ murmurs Sherlock as they get up and let themselves be steered towards a side door, hearing near-riot erupt behind them. Sherlock has the smirk he gets when he’s manipulated a situation. In spite of weeks spent longing to see him crack any smile, John is not pleased about this one. Hell, why do they have to deal with this at all? Is there some parallel universe where they got to go back to Baker Street, unpack and have a cup of tea?

‘Do not underestimate the press, Sherlock,’ John mutters. ‘If you don’t know that by now...’

‘Of course I do,’ Sherlock responds, and there’s a flicker of strain around the edges of the smirk. Sherlock is acting himself, John realises. Much as he did when depressed. 

Fuck’s sake. When can they go _home_?

Not yet. They have a slightly smaller escort of two ’Croft girls and four Met staff as they proceed down a back corridor and end up in a neglected-looking kitchen area where they are told they are going to ‘wait until some of the press have cleared’ before trying to leave. The police PR woman is eyeing Sherlock up. Sherlock sits on a wobbly chair and fiddles with his phone, face frozen into the imperious expression that used to be his default before... everything. 

John wants out. Just for a few minutes. 

‘Bathroom,’ he states in a voice that brooks no argument. He almost expects someone to follow him as he strides away down the hall, but nobody does.

He finds a gents, and takes his time, and when he comes out he doesn’t go straight back to the kitchen. After all, Sherlock can ring him, if need be. They’ve been glued to each other’s side for so long, and now John is wandering alone down a half-lit corridor between meeting rooms shut up for the season vaguely worrying that he shouldn’t have left Sherlock alone... until he analyses his own thoughts and it hits him: the fear that if John isn’t right there 24/7 Sherlock will die at his own hand or someone else’s is no longer justified.

Now what does John do?

He sees Sally Donovan.

She hasn’t seen him. She’s standing alone inside yet another little glass-walled office, working a photocopier, staring vacantly into the air as the machine hums and churns. John blinks; more than anything or anyone else he’s seen yet she is such a jolt back into his previous life that for a moment he feels nothing but displacement.

Then his old hatred wells up. He can’t get at Moriarty any more, but Donovan was Moriarty’s tool, as well as being a bitch in her own right. ‘Freak,’ she said. ‘Stay away from Sherlock Holmes,’ she said. And she couldn’t wait to believe the lies.

‘Not at the press conference, then?’ he says, pushing into the little room. 

She spotted him a split second before he spoke. Her nostrils flare and she picks up her pile of photocopies as if to use it as a barrier between them.

‘I’m working. I’ve got a briefing in ten minutes,’ she says. Then, as if she can’t help herself: ‘My God, it’s really you. I thought you’d gone the same way as him. Except – but he’s not...?’

‘Yes, we’re both alive. No thanks to you.’ John won’t hit her but she’s obviously interpreting his body language as a threat; let her worry. ‘You may not have been at the press conference but I’m here to tell you that Sherlock faked his death, Moriarty was real and we’ve just given the proof to the media.’

‘Yes, I had guessed that much.’ Her sarcasm is brittle. ‘John, if you think I haven’t had any sleepless nights over it, you’re wrong. But the evidence looked watertight. And I’ve had a few other things on my plate as well.’ 

She cocks her head down towards her photocopies; they’re protected by an arm but John still glimpses the words ‘rape’ and ‘suspect’ at the top of the page. Should that give him pause? Maybe it does, but not enough. ‘You hated him, you wanted to take him down, and you took him down. Well done. Get promoted, did you?’

‘Come on. You think I’m down here doing my own photocopying because I got promoted? They moved me sideways, or that’s how they put it. We all worked with Sherlock...’ She shrugs.

‘Sherlock made it pretty clear that Lestrade’ll be getting reinstated or else,’ says John. 

Sally stares, then says abruptly, ‘I'm pleased for him.’

She’s as good as asked _What about me?_

‘Lestrade’ll want his team back,’ John says. ‘The man’s loyal to a fault.’

‘You seriously want to look in the mirror before you say something like that. Yes, I know how decent Greg is. Either way, you needn’t worry I’ll come to Sherlock looking for favours.’

‘As if I thought you would.’ It’s not the right time for this, but then it probably never will be. ‘Look, why’d you have to hate him? Why the name-calling and the eye-rolling and treating him like he’s not human? Anderson’s just a tosser, but you?’

John half-expects a rude response, in which case he’ll let rip. But Sally just puts her photocopies on one of the untenanted desks, and leans against it.

‘Name-calling? You want to try getting _nigger_ shouted at you every day. But Sherlock with that posh accent sticks out even worse than me round here so I tried to be friendly. Got that thrown back in my face soon enough. He decided to tell me what a bore Oxford uni was apart from the drugs.’

Nice. It’s easy enough to imagine Sherlock doing that. John might even have reacted the same way Sally did... to a point.

‘Well, hold the front page, Sherlock can be a twat,’ he says. ‘There are still things you don't do to other human beings.’

‘Like grass them up? Well, it’s not me who treats him like he’s not human. That’s all those people who ooh and aah at him, and they’ll be a hundred times worse now he’s back from the dead.’

‘Those people. You mean me?’

‘No!’ Sally looks like she can’t believe his stupidity. ‘You made him almost bearable. I appreciate that.’

It’s an olive branch. He should probably take it, for the sake of future cases. His heart isn’t in it, but he casts around for something to say.

‘I really didn’t know he was alive until he called me a couple of months ago. Bit of a shock.’

‘Well he wouldn’t care about that,’ replies Sally confidently. John immediately wants to contradict her, then he remembers that the old Sherlock really wouldn’t have cared. 

He knows Sherlock has changed. He just can’t prove to himself that it’s permanent.

‘Look, if you actually want to know what happened, just watch the press conference,’ says John. 

‘Yeah I will, if you don’t ask me to believe it’s the whole story,’ she says. ‘Look, I’ve got a briefing and I’m guessing you didn’t plan on hanging round here either. You heading back to Baker Street?’

John nods. There’s a mixture of sympathy and schadenfreude in her voice, and he’d expect to be disgusted by it, but he’s had too much of that in his life. She’s familiar; apparently that counts.

‘Yes, accompanied by half the press in Britain I don’t doubt,’ he says. ‘Jesus, can’t I shoot just one of them? I’ll pick the most annoying as an example to the rest.’

Sally sniggers. ‘If there’s three hundred photos of you committing murder, I won’t be getting you out of it.’

‘Fine, fine. I’ll ask Mycroft,’ says John. 

Sally collects her photocopies and exits the room, cocking her head at him once. 

Somehow John feels he’s finally been told _Welcome back_.

 

**Sherlock**

Sherlock is on a high from the press conference, or on as much of a high as the lithium will allow him; he’ll probably need to lower his dose before it impedes cases. He has the press on side. Venal and stupid as they are, they understand that the best, by which they mean the most tritely sensational, story is his fall and rise. It will crowd out the unwanted details, and then in turn it will pass. 

John is nervous in the car. Their phones reveal internet reports of them being sighted in Malta and St Petersburg. But Sherlock reminds John in an undertone that the bases are covered: Kolyvanov claimed Russian responsibility for the Maltese men’s deaths as part of his trap for Sherlock, and they knew before they left Piter that Gleb Yevdokimov was claiming to have killed Kolyvanov. There is nothing to link them to the deaths, as the identity of Moriarty’s snipers was not generally known even in criminal circles – it took Sherlock months to identify them. Apart from the old underworld rumour from New York there are no sightings of Sherlock in the US, where he was alone and well-disguised. 

They are going to make it. They almost have made it. Once they’ve shoved through the press pack to reach the 221 front door, Mrs Hudson talks them up the stairs at the rate of five words a second, then makes three separate awkward references to homosexuality, which she seems to believe is a recent cultural innovation that Sherlock has adopted in lieu of more taxing social norms... and leaves them alone. Her kitten heels clack away down the stairs.

‘Wow,’ says John, looking around them with a spacey grin.

Sherlock paces across the living room. He wants to check his bedroom but even more than that he wants to kiss John. It was easy to do that abroad. Here... there is so much more to his life. How does he manage the part of him that loves John?

‘Kiss me,’ he instructs abruptly. At this particular moment the gesture would be symbolic and thus containable.

John does so, briefly. But he’s tense, and he breaks off. ‘I’m sorry,’ he says, and his eyes go to the window. The sounds of some four dozen gentlemen and ladies of the press are plainly audible from below. ‘Just... uncomfortable.’

‘They’ll be gone in a few days,’ says Sherlock. ‘They bore easily.’ 

He heads for his dusty, box-strewn bedroom. He wouldn’t have cringed from the press in his own home, but he’s strangely OK with the fact that John did. Underneath his calculations Sherlock feels raw, and he isn’t supposed to. He was healed. They should both be fine now.

They just need time. It isn’t John’s fault that he’s seen parts of Sherlock that Sherlock now doesn’t know what to do with. Madness. Pain. Those parts will fade. With time.

It takes the rest of this day and all the next for Sherlock to sort out the mess in his room while John hoovers and dusts his way around the rest of the flat. Occasionally they kiss. John sleeps in the single bed in his own room. There is so much else happening that it seems easier.

They ignore their phones until on the morning of day three Sherlock’s ringer sounds with the tone that means Mycroft. After a teeth-gritted conversation, Sherlock admits one _Times_ reporter for an exclusive at-home interview, which he devotes to emphasizing how much he wants to get back to work, along with some piquant observations on the imbecility of selected figures in the judicial and police establishments. John looks worried.

John keeps abreast of the latest reports. _The Daily Star_ claims that Sherlock is really dead and has been replaced by a stunning transsexual body double who has enslaved John Watson through the influence of enormous tits concealed within the Belstaff. _The Daily Mail_ says that decent people are right to be angry with this disgusting publicity stunt but that Sherlock was pushed into it by a combination of his obvious psychological peculiarities and Britain’s out-of-control crime levels, and all this proves that something must finally be done about black gang violence. _The Guardian_ condemns the fact that Britain’s homophobic public is more obsessed with whether Sherlock Holmes is having sex with John Watson than the miscarriage of justice which was Moriarty’s initial acquittal and subsequent depredations, and concludes that we need a more open society. Of all the papers, _The Sun_ plays the story straightest, with not a hint that its earlier coverage may have been substandard; Riley’s byline is notably absent from anywhere in the paper. Satire websites have a field day after John arranges for a Tesco home delivery and has to go down to save the driver. 

Yet in spite of John’s furrowed brow, no serious accusations against them materialise. On the afternoon of day three, Mycroft’s people publicly find some more members of Moriarty’s network to arrest, with the result that the focus of the story shifts away from Sherlock to the criminal gang angle.

Things are going well. Although they are still under siege, the number of reporters halves. As well as camping around the front, the press still lurk behind Mrs Hudson’s bins, but in spite of that John appears late one night in Sherlock’s bedroom, says ‘I’m used to sleeping beside someone else now,’ and gets into the double bed. 

Sherlock nods, tells himself his heart is not hammering, and continues paying attention to his forensics journal for two and a half minutes, which is the point when the bedding rustles convulsively – and a mouth makes its way inside his pyjama trousers. 

The journal falls to the floor. Sherlock slides the waistband off his hips to allow John better access. John has not demanded the access himself, and that trend of non-assertion continues as he lays a hand on Sherlock’s thigh that seems to steady rather than steer. His tongue is insistent but soft, and Sherlock closes his eyes to let images of leather and metal and flesh play against the darkness, because he understands why John is tentative and doesn’t want Sherlock screaming the place down right now, but there are still things he needs in order to climax. Surely John needs them too, or at least wants them? Once the press are gone, will John’s inhibitions go as well?

Sherlock recalls the clenching burn of hot cream on his balls, the stretched swing of his arm in its cuff as John manhandled him... but his arousal has plateaued. There’s only so much that memory plus caresses can do.

Then John’s nails sink into his thigh. _Ah_. Sherlock allows himself the luxury of a groan.

When he comes, it’s almost gentle, and it’s accompanied by the slightly cushioned, lithium-haze feeling of watching himself without much interest. _Yes we did this, and it wasn’t quite right, and I don’t care about that as much as I want to._

John sits up. He hawks semen into a tissue, gives a smirk that is tentative around the edges and says, ‘You really can’t come without pain, then?

‘I seldom try,’ replies Sherlock, sitting up too. ‘Can you get off without controlling or hurting your partner?’

‘Yeah, though it’s not quite as much of a trip. Guess I’m bisexual in more ways than one.’

Sherlock considers. He won’t insult John by fearing to lose him at this point, but there has been a blankness inside Sherlock since he returned. Lithium fog? He doesn’t know. It’s as if something is drifting.

‘I can’t scene right now, anyway,’ he says suddenly. ‘I need to stay focused.’

‘I know,’ says John, even though Sherlock’s excuse was feeble. Somehow the situation has flipped so that John, heroic John, is waiting for him again. ‘Well, with twenty journalists listening in it’s an academic question.’

The observation – and for John it does seem to be a real reason for inhibition – seals the decision. The awkwardness between them gradually fades into sleep, with John’s arm wrapped around Sherlock’s torso.

A few days later they wake up to find that the press have gone.

 

**Sherlock**

‘Wow,’ says John, staring out of the living room window over his steaming RAMC mug. ‘It’s actually like Baker Street instead of Piccadilly Circus out there.’

Sherlock is on his laptop. ‘Aha. I’ve got an email from a certain D.I. Lestrade here,’ he says, and feels himself grin. They managed drinks at an adjunct of the Diogenes club, and at the time Lestrade wasn’t certain his reinstatement would actually occur. Now... the news almost physically warms Sherlock. ‘He tells me there’s a serendipitous crackdown on obstructions to the public highway. I suspect he’s quite influential just now.’ 

John smirks too, looking around. ‘Any cases?’

‘Not yet.’

‘Well. I’ll have a clear run leaving the flat, at least. I wasn’t looking forward to laying about me with a brolly, Mycroft-style.’ 

To their mutual surprise John already has a job interview, this morning at a private clinic. John claims to believe that they want to gawp at the celeb sidekick, but Sherlock suspects the hand of his brother in a serious job offer. He’ll tolerate that, if John will.

‘And I need some body parts,’ Sherlock says, stretching. He has a number of experiments prepared, and Mrs Hudson ditched his frozen flesh supply in his absence. ‘Time to go to Barts.’

John glances around at him. ‘Barts,’ he says flatly. Neither of them have been back there yet.

‘I’ve texted Molly to get the stuff ready.’

‘Ah,’ says John. His watchful look continues for a moment, then softens into a smile. It’s the knowing one he uses when he thinks Sherlock is doing something uncharacteristically human. Well, as it happens Sherlock actually wanted to see Molly before this. But she is sure to have emotions at him, and he’ll feel awkward, and he’ll probably end up upsetting her. The thought of that is unpleasant. Nevertheless.

An hour later, Sherlock steps out of a taxi in front of the pathology building. He walks straight over the spot where he ‘died’, because to walk around it would be irrational, then into the building and up the stairs.

Molly is waiting for him in her lab. He sees her through the windowed door as she hastily bends over an instrument tray to look busy. As he closes in he reads her: broken sleep last night, make-up applied then wiped off and applied again this morning.

When he opens the door her ponytail swings jauntily as she turns her head with a bright smile. 

‘Didn’t hear you coming!’ she exclaims. ‘Wow. I saw the TV coverage. So you succeeded then? Killed everybody?’ 

‘Yes.’ Sherlock replies calmly to her bravado. It’s safe to talk in here. It always has been. ‘Or rather John did.’ Though he owes her the truth, he cannot mention Graf. ‘I specified three testicles in my text message but if you have a fourth I’d appreciate it.’

‘Oh. Oh yes,’ says Molly. ‘They tend to come in pairs. So. Everything you asked for’s in the morgue in freezer three, if you want to go and – oh God. Seeing you again is a bit – well, it’s good, obviously. Are you OK?’

Of course Sherlock is OK. He just has a sense that his body is at a slight remove from him as he sits down awkwardly on a lab stool. ‘I... I killed one of the snipers,’ he says, almost testing the idea for its validity now he’s home. It seems detached from him; sinister and huge.

Molly nods, coming closer. ‘Um, if you didn’t kill him, it was his job to kill one of your friends, wasn’t it?’ It’s half a question; she’s out of her depth when it comes to violence.

‘Yes,’ says Sherlock. He focuses on her instead of the gunshot in his memory. He recalls her trying to smile as he climbed off the bloody stretcher, then guarding the storeroom as he wept. Was that when something broke and his mind sped up? ‘I wanted to see you.’ He feels gratitude, and it’s not unpleasant.

But Molly blushes, and Sherlock realises his misstep. His statement was literally true, but also like something out of one of John’s cheesy films. And while Molly’s crush was once convenient, the idea of exploiting her is no longer palatable. 

‘I’m romantically and sexually involved with John,’ Sherlock says. ‘It began in Malta, and I think it’ll last.’

Molly freezes. ‘Oh,’ she says, then sits down clumsily on a stool. ‘Well. I knew that. I mean, it’s all over the papers, not that they... I... God, you must think I’m a moron. I _am_ a moron. I go for the gay one every time. Every time!’

She seems to be appealing to the workbench for an answer. It’s Sherlock who owes her one, but this is definitively not his area. Yet once she told him _You always say such horrible things_ , and he doesn’t want to be like that.

‘It’s possible that gay men share some genetic or social characteristics which appeal to you,’ Sherlock says. ‘But since the biological origins of homosexuality are poorly understood, it would be difficult to define those characteristics. There must be straight men who have them, and your chances with such a man would be good.’

Molly looks at him sideways, raising incredulous eyebrows, but she doesn’t speak, so Sherlock forges on.

‘You’re quite feminine, and you’re about on a level with John for intelligence. That and your career choice will intimidate some men, but not the ones who’re worth your attention. I’ve observed low self-worth in many women, and in your case it’s unjustified.’ 

Molly nods once, slowly. She’s already a little more composed, he’s pleased to see. ‘Sherlock... that was horrible... and a compliment. You compliment me by telling me the truth, don’t you?

He considers that. It is and isn’t correct. He tells everyone portions of the truth, but the fact that Molly copes with most of it makes her worth bothering with. When he didn’t even have John, he had her.

‘Yes,’ he agrees. He can’t give her what she really wants, but this is still true: ‘I need you, as I said.’

Molly smiles a little sadly. ‘What for, now you’re back? To keep you supplied with eyeballs?’

‘Not just that.’ He pauses, wondering what he’s doing, then the words seem to claw their way up his throat: ‘I went mad.’

She blinks at him uncertainly. ‘You mean you had to do some pretty, um, hairy things when you were undercover?’

‘No, although I did,’ Sherlock replies. He’d better see this through now. ‘What I mean is that I have manic depression.’

Beat. She doesn’t react. Then she says ‘Oh, Sherlock!’ softly.

‘Jumping, or hitting my head, or leaving London, or something triggered a cycle, and it actually caused more problems than the snipers. John had to dissuade me from killing myself, which he probably found ironic.’ Sherlock studies the bench, waiting. Molly’s a trained doctor, so she should understand what she’s been told. If her reaction is silly, he will simply leave. It was a stupid risk to tell her at all. Stupid. But he wants her to react well.

‘Actually, I’m not entirely surprised,’ Molly says. ‘My aunt and cousin have it, and I’ve wondered a bit about you. But I thought you’d rip my head off if I said anything.’

Her mundane response is simultaneously a relief and annoying. 

‘They’re pretty much OK now.’ She responds to his look as if he’d asked a question. ‘Auntie Em had to go into hospital a couple of times, but that was a few years ago, before they got her meds right. I know bipolar can be awful.’

Understatement. ‘Lithium seems to be working for me,’ says Sherlock. ‘Fortunately John can prescribe without involving anyone else. So my illness won’t be appearing in the tabloids. Nor will your involvement in my jump.’

He sees a shadow cross her face at John’s name. Her smile gets brittle.

‘I know,’ says Molly. ‘Sherlock, I...’ Suddenly she jumps up and wraps her arms around him side on, leaning her head on his shoulder. He can feel her tension, but her voice is level. ‘Sherlock, I’m your friend. Having a – a crush on you isn’t actually relevant, when it comes down to it. Just look after yourself, please. Let John make you happy.’

Sherlock has tensed up at her touch. This seems unkind so he makes himself relax. But he has no mental map for this, for caring about it. He makes himself put a hand up to stroke Molly’s hair, just the once. She feels soft, and she smells clean and practical like her lab.

‘I don’t know how to be fair to you,’ he says. 

Molly laughs a bit shakily, detaching from him. ‘Life’s not fair, Sherlock. I’d rather have you rejecting me than Jim being fake, so we’re doing OK, right?’

‘Yes.’ She handled ‘Jim’ better than he did, all things considered. Strange thought. ‘You should have seen me in a manic rage, though.’ He should stop talking about this stuff. He can’t. ‘Or suicidal. I was not my best self.’ It feels like if she recoils he’ll have achieved something.

Instead she looks at him with the shrewdness he ignored for some years. ‘I bet you were awful, yes. But Sherlock, who a person is doesn’t change.’ She looks down. ‘My Dad in his last few days, he was still my Dad. I can’t imagine you not you, if that’s what’s worrying you – God, I didn’t say that very well, but you know what I mean. I bet John feels the same.’

Sherlock is listening. He told John _I’m still me_ even on lithium, so he shouldn’t need her reassurance. And yet. In spite of her awkwardness, a view seen through her eyes is a view refined in new ways. She sees his commitment to John, and it hurts her, but she doesn’t class it with madness. She accepts their coexistence in him, and the affirmation is absurdly, shamefully powerful. How can people affect him like this?

Clearly some do, and he is not interested in denying facts.

‘John has been exceptionally helpful,’ says Sherlock. ‘You too. You’re honest when it matters. Very few people are.’

‘Really? Maybe I’m catching it off you lately,’ Molly gives a little waggle of her head. ‘I haven’t got much else going for me, have I?’ 

Sherlock considers. There must be a socially adept response to that, but wanting not to be horrible and achieving compassionate eloquence are apparently not the same. 

‘Shall we go to the morgue?’ he says. He and Molly should both stick to body parts.

‘OK,’ she agrees, just as he realises that failing to make a response to her rhetorical question was worse than saying something inane. There is a huge, empty moment. Then Molly gives him a watery smile.

Sherlock smiles back. Not the reflexive, contemptuous smile, but the one he keeps for John, and in response the contours of Molly’s expression change. Her face lights up. 

‘You are attractive when you smile,’ says Sherlock. There’s still an emotional mess here, but it seems to have become bearable for her, and that is strangely important to him. Stranger still, feeling that way feels in some respects good. ‘Now, corpses, please?’ 

 

**John**

John is offered the clinic job on the spot. ‘Mycroft Holmes is paying you, isn’t he,’ he says, considering whether to walk out. They don’t deny it.

And then he takes the job. Steady work on the CV is steady work on the CV, and they say they won’t mind him coming and going as his ‘consultancy’ for Sherlock demands. A man with something to prove might reject this arrangement, but John is no longer such a man.

As he walks into the Baker Street kitchen, Sherlock is – good grief, he is actually dissecting a human testicle.

‘OK, I like a bit of CBT too, but....’ says John, peering at the mess.

‘Don’t worry, it’s not Mycroft’s,’ Sherlock responds drily, moving to peer down his microscope. ‘Was he behind this job interview?’

‘Yeah, but I took the position anyway,’ says John, and shrugs when Sherlock turns around in surprise. ‘I have to be honest with myself: my day job’s not what I care about most, is it? I want a gig where they’ll let me help you on cases.’

‘Understood,’ says Sherlock. He looks appreciative, and John’s reaction is no longer surprise. Worrying that Sherlock might revert is futile. 

Sherlock’s mobile, sitting on the tabletop away from the chemistry kit, vibrates. He stares at it, motionless, then grabs it. ‘From Lestrade. _Case!_ ’ he lets the word out in a long, hard hiss.

Sherlock starts packing his experiment away. John picks up the phone and reads the brief details of what looks like a locked-room murder mystery with some unknown poison. Perfect for Sherlock. And him.

‘Get your boots back on,’ says Sherlock. ‘Looks like this one could keep us busy for a while. If we’re still functional afterwards, you can top the hell out of me.’

John’s stomach does a flip. He lunges for his discarded footwear.

They’re back, and their lives are going to fit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can read the backstory for my version of Sally [here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/333623).


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They’ve killed and survived and come back from the darkness. Now John and Sherlock will find a way to make things work.

**Sherlock**

Five days later, Sherlock has just slept for fourteen hours straight. He pisses, dresses, and goes yawning into the kitchen to find John drinking tea at the table.

John gives him a hard, slightly speculative look and instructs: ‘Go out. Buy something sharp. Razorblades, a knife, it’s up to you. You’re the one getting cut open.’

Sherlock’s stomach does a flip. 

He smiles, and goes.

He proceeds to a ‘personal protection’ establishment where he is already well-known, and where they are happy to show him under-the-counter goods. He selects a left-handed military knife, beautifully balanced, wickedly sharp and legally dubious. The staff member who sells it to him, and who used to be sensible before Sherlock became an icon, takes an unnecessarily awed approach.

‘For Dr Watson?’ she says, seeing him grip the blade with an unaccustomed left hand.

‘Yes,’ replies Sherlock. She obviously thinks he’s smiling oddly at her, when in fact a mixture of anticipation and fear is producing his expression. The roil of feeling fascinates in itself: he wanted this. ‘Wrap it please. It amounts to a gift.’

 

**John**

John arranges the flat while he’s alone. There’s no real need to tidy the kitchen, and he’s breaking his frequent vow to never clear away Sherlock’s messes for him, but it’s symbolic. When he goes into Sherlock’s room he removes the bedding and replaces it with a plastic underlay and clean white sheet that he's bought for the purpose.

Mrs Hudson is out. In spite of Lestrade, John can’t squelch his worry that the paparazzi will be lurking outside, particularly as ‘Holmes returns to form!’ is all over the papers after the case they just finished, but it’s no good putting their lives on hold. 

He’s done some shopping of his own. Now he fastens the chains to each corner of Sherlock’s bed, and steps back to observe the pristine white surface. Images parade through his head: fisting, cutting, burning. Sometimes he wonders if Sherlock knows how dark John’s fantasies get, but equally often he suspects Sherlock’s get darker. 

When Sherlock arrives back he treads heavily on the stairs, clearly wanting John to hear him. John deposits his coil of rope on the floor of the bedroom beside Sherlock’s cuffs and a couple of strips of gauze, and just stands where he’ll be visible through the open door. 

Sherlock approaches. He is unexpectedly nervous – the box he’s carrying is wrapped but Sherlock is ripping his way into it as he walks, shedding fragments of paper, and when he reaches John he places the naked handle of a shapely knife directly into John’s palm and blurts, ‘Cut me!’ His eyes slide towards the chains on the bed.

John closes his fingers around the handle.

‘Yes, that’s in the schedule,’ he says after a long moment. ‘But this needs to be sterilised first, as well you know.’

Sherlock folds his arms and attempts to look relaxed. The fact that he fails is an additional spice, first for John, and then for Sherlock himself as he visibly accepts that his discomfort is a mark of John’s control. Their eyes meet again. Electric.

‘You just strip and put the cuffs on,’ John says. ‘Leave the rest to me.’

 

**Sherlock**

Sherlock bites his lip to avoid scowling as John goes to boil the kettle. It would be ridiculous to be nervous about controlled pain, but he wants touch, not the rote duty of fitting his own wrist and ankle cuffs. For days he has been focused on the case, and on John as an adjunct to his purpose, and now he just wants pure John. Is John nervous too? They said playing would come naturally, with no disruption from the nature of their return, yet it didn’t happen. They are trying now. 

Still, once Sherlock starts, there is something both lewd and calming about the process of removing his clothes then preparing himself to be hurt, while beyond the open doorway John slips a knife into bubbling water. The sterilisation process seems half military discipline, half rite, and it snags Sherlock’s focus in the moment. Then John glances around, and Sherlock freezes with the last cuff half-fastened, his stomach lurching, because John’s eyes are afire. John is normally so constrained. Sherlock changes that.

He finishes the final cuff, then drops to his knees and bows his head, and waits. 

John comes into the bedroom. A slight hitch in his stride communicates that he didn’t expect such submissive behaviour. Neither did Sherlock, in fact. 

‘Nice. Now, head up.’ 

John takes a short piece of rope from the floor and uses it to create a collar with a non-slip knot. He loops Sherlock’s wrist cuffs to the collar, very close up, as if in praying position. Then he picks up the gauze strip, and Sherlock has one last glimpse of his top’s craftsmanlike expression before he is blindfolded, the world is turning first shadowy and then completely black as the material is wound round and round his head.

It’s dark. Sherlock scans for data via his other senses... then lurches as the rope around his neck is unexpectedly grabbed and pulled. He scrambles forwards on his knees, probably towards the bed. The dragging stops, and he hears John fastening the rope around the bed leg. It’s only inches from where Sherlock’s thigh has come to rest. He’s being tethered. Fuck, that’s humiliating... fuck, that’s hot. John’s presence is heavy in the air. He comes around behind Sherlock and ties the rings of his ankle cuffs together. 

‘OK. Stay put,’ he says. ‘You can wait a little longer.’ 

Like Sherlock has much choice. John’s footsteps recede to the kitchen, and Sherlock experiments with movements, shifting his arse and knees from side to side, and changing his hands from dangling so that the rope pulls on his neck to cupped around his chin to folded against his neck. Nothing is comfortable, and while he could in theory get at the knot around the bed leg by falling onto his side and groping for it, John would no doubt be on him in seconds. 

He is blind and bound and waiting to be tortured. Not inside his own mind, but in the physical world. John is in control. He hears John moving around the living room, and occasionally returning to look through the bedroom door. 

‘I can actually see you calming down,’ says John. 

That’s not what Sherlock would call it. And yet there is the feeling of drifting. Thrumming in his head... focus on John... anticipation-fear. 

John has gone back to the kitchen. There’s a sound of droplets hitting water as he lifts out the knife. As he examines it and wipes it off Sherlock follows the movements by ear. ‘You’re not afraid?’ John inquires through the doorway, conversational.

Of course he is; but the fear is a little separate from him. So are most things, apparently, and he’s trying to focus on an answer when John comes back in. 

‘Well, be afraid now.’ John orders him, suddenly intense. ‘And seriously, do not move.’ 

He fists a hand in Sherlock’s hair. Sherlock senses the knife slipping into the gap between his hands and his throat, then feels it tapping at his Adam’s apple. 

‘Talk to me,’ John says. 

‘Yes, I’m afraid,’ Sherlock murmurs, trying to breathe shallowly. Fear slithers down his spine, twisting then turning to heat through his groin. John is calm and deadly. ‘Cut me.’ 

But the knife withdraws. ‘I’m not starting with your neck,’ John says, a slight laugh in his voice. 

He moves off, and Sherlock hears the clink of chains. Presumably he’s supposed to wait again, so he tries to settle into it, but his bound hands feel huge, and there’s nowhere to put them. He shifts them from cupping his cheeks to under his chin. 

‘As you’ve probably deduced, being a genius, I’m going to spread-eagle you,’ John says as he works. ‘You should barely be able to flinch.’ 

Sherlock is silent. John is going to wreck him. This is going to be too much. He should safeword out of it... No. He wants to be hurt and hurt and lose himself. He’s home. 

And John is untethering him from the bed leg. He tries to shift his weight, anticipating a push sideways, but John pulls him up by his hair so that he gasps and staggers on hobbled feet, trying blindly for balance. Sherlock has barely stabilised, his vision swimming in darkness, when John drags him around the bed, using the loose end of the collar as a leash, then shoves him backwards. Feet still on the floor he falls, hitting the sheet with a crackle of the underlying plastic, and as his head jerks back his blindfold slips, letting in a slant of vision.

John’s face appears between Sherlock and the electric light. There’s a moment of breathless stillness, then John says ‘ _Got_ you,’ with a decided air of smugness, and Sherlock lets out something that sounds even to him like a giggle. John dips down for a kiss; by wriggling his cuffed hands around, Sherlock just manages to cup John’s face and stroke his cheeks, and the moment turns oddly gentle, and John’s breath is warm and his cheek smooth-shaven.

The knife is in John’s hand. The blade is cold against Sherlock’s hip.

‘Be still,’ John orders. The steel edge runs down Sherlock’s naked flank. While the movement is mostly smooth, he feels a small pain flare in his hip. When he cranes his head around he sees a thin red streak welling into droplets. 

John has cut him. He’s bleeding. John controls him. He can’t quite think, and here and now that is good. _Cut me._

‘I have to undo you and chain you out flat,’ says John in a practical voice. ‘No wriggling, just while I sort the ropes.’ 

Sherlock is content to obey. He feels light, as if he were floating just above his body, while John unhooks his hands from their awkward constriction at his chest and stretches first one arm then the other straight out towards the top corners of the bed. As each wrist and then ankle is fixed, Sherlock tests the bonds: taut and secure.

The blindfold, however, has worked almost free of his head. Sherlock wonders if John will replace it when he’s finished sorting the chains, but he doesn’t. Instead, he pulls it completely off. ‘I want –’ John starts. 

‘– to see me struggling,’ Sherlock finishes for John, slightly proud that his voice works properly. He remembers: _I want to see how much this hurts you_ , and _I want to see how you cope._

‘That’s right,’ says John. He reaches out to the bedside table, and then rights himself, crouched over Sherlock, knees caging Sherlock’s ribs, leaning forward so that his blue eyes are so very close – and he presses the blade to Sherlock’s lips. 

Taking the cue, Sherlock kisses it. 

John shifts the knife down and draws a long, shallow cut on Sherlock’s right shoulder. 

Pain, shocking and bright. Sherlock whimpers, his attention magnetised to the spot. Cricking his neck he can see a line of red welling up. He knows it’s nothing very serious. John will not do real harm. Yet he’s naked and helplessly bound and John, flushed with desire, is starting to caress his left nipple with the point of the knife. John is a sadist. Sherlock is a masochist, but he’s afraid. 

‘No,’ he says. He half means it. 

John responds with a sharp look at first; a flash of serious assessment. Then he says calmly, ‘Yes, Sherlock,’ and almost playfully nicks the skin close to his nipple.

Sherlock settles, trying not to pant and risk unintentional gashes. John runs a soothing hand over his chest, then returns and finishes drawing a dotted circle of little cuts around his nipple, each one a dipping flicker of hurt. After finishing there, he slices a smooth red line from aureole to clavicle. 

Sherlock whimpers. At least, though, he is inside the pain now, acclimatising – until John turns the knife upside down and drags the end of the handle along the length of the raw cut. Coarse, burning abrasion... Sherlock cries out, and John covers Sherlock’s mouth with his hand. To be so casually silenced... anger fuels his arousal. Hopeless confusion of sensations. More.

Sherlock moans, gagged. John slices again, on his breastbone, and again, on his shoulders, at the base of his neck. Breastbone again. A burning drag of the knife handle. The pains blur and mass, throbbing in complex, uneven rhythms. He can’t cry out. John is cutting him. John doesn’t stop. There is John’s blade, and John’s silencing hand. 

‘Hurts,’ croaks Sherlock when the hand is finally removed. He doesn’t know if John wants him to speak – but a sweetness is humming through his system, twining with the pain. John must sense it too. 

John ignores him. He kneels up straighter, moving cautiously on his bad leg, then pulls his t-shirt off over his head and throws it onto the floor. He bends over Sherlock’s chest and licks a swathe across the cuts. The saliva sends messages of balm and chafe and confusion to Sherlock’s reeling brain. His reactions are not working, and he has learnt this means disease. He is ill... no. The darkness broke. This is their pleasure. John places his palms flat on either side of Sherlock’s head and smiles. Sherlock takes a shuddery breath, and John’s lips descend to his. 

Softness, and the taste of iron. Fingers caress his shoulder, catching on raw flesh. John is in him and on him, tongue fucking blood into his body. Sherlock is content. 

 

**John**

This is forbidden. Sexy. Desperate. He is cutting Sherlock open. Blood stains the sheet and is sticky between them as John presses in. It’s real, not a nightmare of the fall. He is in control, and he chooses that Sherlock should bleed. 

John pulls away from Sherlock’s mouth, rocking back on his haunches. When there’s a sound of protest, he twirls the knife in his hand then rests it point down on Sherlock’s nipple. Sherlock, sweaty-faced, cranes gingerly to look at it.

‘I won’t cut your heart out,’ says John. ‘There are plenty of other things I can do.’

He raises his eyebrows to prompt a response. He needs to be sure that Sherlock is with him.

Sherlock swallows, picking up the cue. ‘Severed thumbs are.. somewhat B-movie,’ he manages hoarsely.

Good. Sherlock is keeping up. John smirks down at him. 

John swings the knife, and slashes Sherlock’s throat. 

Sherlock screams. He bucks in the bondage, almost unseating John. This is Sherlock though – even drunk on fear, John sees him deduce mid-lurch that he has a windpipe left to scream with because John used the blunt side of the knife. 

‘Beautiful. I should keep you like this. Tied up and bleeding and terrified,’ John suggests as Sherlock falls back, rolling his eyes with an attempt at nonchalance. Then Sherlock gives up, and nods, and he’s giggling. His whole body shakes with it – endorphins. John thinks, _I did this_ , and a wave of joy washes through him, and he leans forward and wraps a hand around Sherlock’s neck. 

‘Enough laughing.’ John squeezes in the way that always seems to affect Sherlock most, not hard enough to cut off air completely but enough to make his breath rattle as his nostrils flare. John needs Sherlock focused. They walk this edge together. 

Muscles shift in Sherlock’s neck. His body relaxes a little, though his arousal shows in the fluttering of his eyelids and in the way he opens his tethered hands as if reaching for something. _I did this_. John’s cock stirs in his trousers and he rubs himself against Sherlock’s ribs, the pressure maddeningly light as he can’t kneel low enough. Sherlock stares, eyes large and dark. 

‘You really are a picture,’ says John softly. ‘... Shall I shove the knife up your arse?’ 

Sherlock goes absolutely still. John watches thoughts cross his face: _Yes, I look good... Shove the knife where?_

‘Well?’ John prompts, letting go of Sherlock’s throat and seeing a soft red bloom on the skin. Sherlock needs this release, and John needs to see it, but Sherlock will surely work out his intent after the throat slash trick... So John will introduce just enough doubt by lying outright. ‘Blade first.’ 

‘No!’ croaks Sherlock, and there’s fear, uncertainty and desire in his voice. He cranes to follow as John climbs off him. 

‘Lie back,’ John instructs, careful not to let his own voice waver. Once Sherlock obeys, John replaces the blindfold, removes his own trousers and pants, then picks up the discarded pillows and with a bit of struggle inserts them under the small of Sherlock’s back. He’s still too thin, but not so much so that John can’t grip a handful of arse, grazing his thumbnail down Sherlock’s perineum and anus. John’s tongue has explored there, and no doubt his cock will follow but today he fucks Sherlock with the knife.

‘Perfect,’ John says at last, taking up the knife and blindfold gauze. He positions himself crouching between Sherlock’s spread legs. 

Sherlock is completely quiet now. John toys for a while with his balls and half-hard cock, stroking with the tip of the knife, then moves down to make small slashes in the sensitive skin of his inner thighs. Sherlock flinches and whimpers quietly. He’s tangibly waiting, fixed on the obscene violence promised him. The fear and trust and expectation wrap around John, sink in, exalt him. He is more than himself. 

‘You get hard when I hurt you,’ John murmurs, then kisses Sherlock’s balls, and his cock, and the soft creases at the top of his thighs. ‘You want this. Blade first.’ The point of the knife skims down Sherlock’s perineum then dallies for a while at his hole. 

Sherlock whimpers, then begins to pant, high and fast. John wraps some gauze around the knife-blade to make a grip, working swiftly now in case Sherlock loses it and safewords. That done, he licks the exposed handle... then rams it into Sherlock, twisting as he goes. 

Sherlock screams. The sound is as frenzied and despairing as if a blade really was rupturing his insides, and for a moment the force of it scares John. What if pulling a mindfuck on Sherlock has triggered something? After enduring so much...

No. John is in control. He caresses Sherlock’s hip, and when the scream ends there is a long, shuddering sigh. This is working. 

He kisses Sherlock’s thigh, then starts fucking his arse with the knife. 

 

**Sherlock**

Sherlock squirms on the violating knife. What he knows to be a handle jerks arhythmically, sending up sparks of bliss, but in his mind it becomes the mutilating blade, and he embraces agony, freefall, death in life. Is this madness? 

No. It’s memory, and he lets it in. He’s falling. He falls so far there’s no way back, and the shock of the ground splinters him, and lithium cannot stem the flow of blood into the snow. Blood drags at his hair, and alien hands lift him, and he cannot bear it but it happens, must happen, so there is a shift in his head, and his emotions... but he has no emotions... He must not move or John will die. 

For John he will go into fire.

 _No_. Sherlock is in Baker Street. John is holding him, fucking him, cutting him. The blindfold slips, loosened again by his writhing; Sherlock looks down at his sprawled body and John is there, violating, claiming, intent. He's kissing a cut on Sherlock’s hip, and when he looks up, bloody-mouthed, Sherlock’s heart leaps, because this is the difficult all of John, and Sherlock has him.

Sherlock fell, and John reached after him. When Sherlock was broken, John set firm and hard. They are joined through the knife, through the violence, through the heave of moods, and Sherlock will not let go. The knowledge takes him, mingling with the darkness. Sherlock merges with the void, and John is there. John has always been there. John strokes his leg. Sherlock drifts, and everything is good, because John is within it.

Gradually, the knife slows.

‘You’re almost done, I think,’ says John.

Reluctantly, Sherlock considers his body. John is right. Nausea is beginning to stir in his belly and his manacled hands are turning numb.

‘Mm,’ he says, and feels the empty chill as John withdraws the knife. Sherlock hears him wiping it and setting it aside on the bed.

‘All right,’ says John, and a hand wraps around Sherlock’s cock, sending bolts of fire to his brain.

‘ _No,_ ’ says Sherlock, hoarsely but firmly.

He feels John freeze in place. He tries to think. He sprawled on the pavement, unseeing, while John pleaded. Now... he has to articulate...

‘John. Come while... you hurt me. I need to watch you. Please.’

 

**John**

With the angry exception of his first time with Sherlock, in fully sexual scenes John always attends to his partner before himself. It’s the sensible thing.

Well, fuck that. Sherlock specifically asked. John lets go of Sherlock’s cock and leans forward to pull off the blindfold.

‘All right,’ he says, and wipes his forehead with a sticky hand.

Sherlock nods, squinting against the return of light. John studies his face; various tells indicate that he’s pushing his limits. John will not let him fall. He kisses and nips Sherlock’s chest, then climbs off the bed to remove his own remaining clothes.

‘You want?’ he says, pointing to his erection. When Sherlock nods and gropes symbolically with a bound hand, John says, ‘Uh-uh, no touching.’ He puts one knee on the bed and leans forward, just brushing his shaft along cuts and smooth skin and too-prominent bones as Sherlock tries to twist towards him. Then there’s a deeper profusion of sensation as John straddles Sherlock’s torso and grasps his own erection with one hand, raking blunt nails across Sherlock’s bloody chest with the other. Sherlock’s cock must be jutting neglected behind him. Sherlock is splayed out and bleeding, on the edge of endurance. 

John will keep him there. 

_Yes_. Control and care and service, strands of his life that never quite fitted until now. Pleasure. They smile at each other. No masks now, as if they ever needed them. 

‘Please...’ Sherlock murmurs, focusing with visible effort as John sways above him.

‘Watch,’ says John. He means too many things to express in one word. 

Inside him are the moments when he saw Sherlock smashed on the pavement, when he opened the door to find him suspended eleven stories above the snow. The horror remains, but it’s not the sum of their connection. John pulls on his cock, and there is a rhythm to the jerking of Sherlock’s body as if Sherlock were fucking him, he feels Sherlock fucking him, hears Sherlock whimpering, visibly near his limit but unwilling to safeword, and John accepts that gift and rides it, pleasuring himself with one hand while the other tortures Sherlock. 

A tear slides from Sherlock’s eye. John leans in to lick it up, tasting the mingled blood, then straightens himself again as Sherlock gives a full-body shudder, struggling reflexively to move in the bondage. He can’t. John, straddling him upright, tightens his legs around Sherlock, absorbing the frantic squirming. 

Heavy bliss pools in John’s groin. It coils upwards, refines to a peak, builds higher. It flares and twists like burning paper. John is controlling, hurting, loving Sherlock, who is shaking, keening, mad, safe. They are alive. Simple grace.

John comes. He bucks forwards, riding each wave, a fragment of his brain handling awareness of the need not to collapse heavily onto Sherlock. Sherlock is groaning, gasping, and the thought of him pinned, willing, suffering while John orgasms is a dark sweetness suffusing what remains of thought.

‘Fuck, John!’ Sherlock is moaning. John's come stripes his bloody chest. Pain and sex and homecoming. Blood on his hands and the bed, on Sherlock's living face.

John sways, rolls to the side and fetches up with his head pillowed on Sherlock's upstretched right arm. Their mouths are close enough to kiss and kiss and kiss.


	4. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When the crisis has passed, how do you turn a beginning into a liveable lifetime?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> MAD AUTHORIAL FLAIL BECAUSE I FINISHED EEET.

**Epilogue**

_March_

**Sherlock**

Sherlock strides across the damp playing field in the centre of Regent’s Park. 

As a rule he walks the streets during downtime, sucking secrets from facades and crowds and alleys as he goes. But journalists remain persistent and there is less chance of them in the park, on a rainy grey day when few people are even exercising their dogs. 

Nature of course provides less data than the cityscape does, and his thoughts range. He reviews the three months since his return, taking the opportunity to file and sort the case of the candle killer, where a man choked on beeswax while Sherlock pursued false information. The idea of bees connects to his mother, to the memory of her carrying his small self to see the hives on the family estate. That image has visited him many times these past weeks – without bringing its old grief. 

It seems that the ability to recall his mother with less pain is a result of his recent experiences. A curious side-effect. 

He has known what she knew. If he could only tell her.

Twilight approaches as Sherlock walks past a park café that is closing for the day. Paper crackles against his glove as he pushes his hand into his pocket, but there’s no hurry to find a pharmacy. The prescription has been in his pocket for two weeks. 

‘This is the last time I’ll do this,’ said John as he wrote it. ‘I haven’t got the training, even if I wasn’t your partner. You need a psychiatrist to manage this long-term.’

John believed that Sherlock was in danger of becoming depressed over the beeswax death. Incorrect. The problem is rather that, in the absence of stimulants, lithium continues to render him numb, and however desirable that may once have seemed, the result is intellectual blunting. 

So a week ago he halved his lithium dose. He can always increase it again if symptoms return. In any case, a strong mind, given the forewarning he previously lacked, might be able to harness mild to moderate mania without pills. 

His walk has brought him to the formal, bench-lined vista of the Broadwalk. Overhead, the cloud-scattered early spring sky is a faded blue, shading to grey where twilight is beginning. This is London’s native austerity, and it’s no more or less real than white death above Piter or seething electricity over Malta. Sky, like emotion, is a trick of light and vapour masking void. 

Sherlock lowers his gaze, and sees John standing ahead on the path, alone and hatless in the rain.

The pressure in Sherlock’s heart is irrational and urgent and sweet. Surely this is not returning sickness, whatever John would say about lithium levels. John always frets, about Interpol investigations and Kitty Riley and possible revelations of bipolar and deviance, and he looks as if he’s fretting now, waving his phone as he approaches. Sherlock plays the violin when John is anxious – yesterday the music suffused him at last, no longer a vague presence just beyond his clumsy fingers. Later they fucked, and John caned him and rode him and they flew. 

‘I had to track your phone again,’ John says when they’re a few paces apart. ‘Check your messages sometimes! Lestrade’s got a case.’

Sherlock’s heart beats. John. Cases. Life. ‘Where?’

‘Shoreditch. Artist types. He’ll tell you more in person.’

‘Better get there, then.’ Sherlock brushes a hand across the small of John’s back and gets a sneaky thrill from the public touch – which irritates him. Enough inane subterfuge. ‘Just as well I’ve halved my lithium dose. I have to be able to think, and to want to do so.’

There’s silence as they hurry towards the Outer Circle road. He won’t worry, or rehearse justifications in his head. John said he couldn’t be Sherlock’s doctor, so Sherlock is treating himself. Logic.

‘Okay...’ says John ruminatively. ‘I shouldn’t be surprised by that. I’ve noticed you’ve been more yourself lately, which is obviously good as far as it goes. Just tell me you’re doing this under psychiatric supervision.’

‘No,’ replies Sherlock, although John’s failure to blow a fuse makes him feel somehow unsure of himself. ‘I will if...’

He’s going to say _if it becomes necessary_ , but John interrupts: ‘If you lose your mind? If you die?’ 

Sherlock stops walking. John has already halted, leaning on a bench. ‘Shit,’ John says. ‘All right. I'm aware it’s your decision, Sherlock. I can’t know what lithium feels like.’

What _did_ the full dose feel like? Blurring and softening. It cushioned moments like this, when an ache starts up in Sherlock’s chest and he resents it, because he didn’t ask to feel distressed just because the man beside him is. More lithium would numb him to that. Or mania would carry him too high to care.

Too high to care.

Sherlock’s throat is dry. He doesn’t want that any more. Through and beyond the lurch of moods, John is part of him. John is his compass.

He is causing John pain.

‘All right, I’ll consult a psychiatrist,’ Sherlock says. ‘ _When_ the case is finished. And it won’t be the Harley Street fop Mycroft recommended. And rest assured I won’t humour them.’

John is watching him side-on now, his expression developing from weariness to cautious belief as he listens to the provisos. He nods. He may think Sherlock is saving face in the teeth of a concession. 

Not as such. Sherlock has calculated, and drawn a conclusion.

His teenage years of being prodded by ‘professionals’ are indelible. The festering richness of mania, and the months of living by default because he didn’t know whether strength meant resistance to death or to the fear of it, are part of him as well. They are not, however, the whole.

‘Did you doubt me in Russia?’ he asks. 

John doesn't hesitate. ‘Your sincerity, no,’ he says. ‘But I sometimes doubted you, or we, would survive.’

‘Reasonable,’ replies Sherlock, looking for a cab as they emerge onto the Outer Circle. ‘When my intellectual functioning improved in the metro, I was able to think, and I thought of you.’

John doesn’t immediately answer, so Sherlock turns around to study him. Old pain has surfaced on John’s face, among the new lines and the dark circles from the nightmares that have resurged since Piter. But John is weathering it; so will Sherlock.

‘I couldn’t force you to live when it just meant suffering,’ says John. The addition _part of me wanted to_ shows in his expression but remains unspoken. ‘I get why psychiatry grates on you, Sherlock, but it might stop all that coming back. Or, granted, it might not.’

Sherlock nods. ‘John, I am alive,’ he says, although the statement isn't profound enough for its meaning: how John washed the bloodstains into that white sheet so they could fuck on it again, Sherlock moaning as bruises rose on his skin, kissing John's bullet scars; how the bliss of mania remains a deep sun buried inside him. Sexual, chemical, emotional transgression. Truth as uneven, vital pulse.

He let go of absolutes in Piter. He won't seek them again.

‘Yes you’re alive,’ says John softly. He strokes Sherlock’s cheek, and the drizzly street ignores them. ‘What's your point?’

Sherlock would like to explain himself fully. John is the pivot on which life tips into pleasure, and Sherlock will accept psychiatry as a necessity for transport. They are mortal, and what they have is this moment. 

He healed to know these things.

‘I mean that I see you,’ he says.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading this series. Please leave a comment if you can.
> 
> I have bipolar (type 2), and Sherlock’s symptoms are modelled on mine, if transposed into a more exciting context. We're both lucky in that we have a diagnosis, medication, enough money, education that allows us to navigate medical systems, a supportive partner and friends. Not everyone is that fortunate. Estimates of bipolar rates among the homeless in major UK and US cities varies from five to thirty per cent. Stigma is still widespread. In Britain the charity Bipolar UK recently had to withdraw some of its services because of a funding crisis.  
> So if you’ve enjoyed Four Corners of the Western World, please consider donating the standard cost of an ebook novel in your country to a mood disorders charity. Options include [Bipolar UK](http://www.bipolaruk.org.uk/donate/), [Depression and Bipolar Alliance (US)](http://www.dbsalliance.org).


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